Tools and testing
Cognitive
- Last reviewed
- 9 August 2026
Tools and techniques to help you test for cognitive accessibility.
Cognitive impairments
Cognitive impairments can affect how people process information, focus, learn and remember.
Common conditions include:
learning disabilities, such as dyslexia and dyscalculia memory issues, including brain fog, Alzheimer's disease and dementia mental health conditions, such as anxiety and depression brain injuries, including stroke and traumatic brain injury
Barriers to consider
Cognitive impairments can make it difficult to:
process and understand information focus for long periods remember information, such as passwords complete tasks without help understand complex or unfamiliar language find and understand important information
How to test
Start with automated checks
Use accessibility testing tools to identify common accessibility issues. Automated checks are a useful starting point, but they cannot identify every barrier.
You can use tools such as:
axe DevTools WAVE Evaluation ARC Toolkit Accessibility Insights
See [Find and use tools] for more information about these tools and when to use them.
Do manual checks
Manual checks can identify issues that automated tools cannot. Check that:
content uses clear and consistent language headings and page structure make content easy to find users can understand what they need to do users can recover from errors users can save their progress and return later where appropriate content remains understandable when text spacing is increased
You can use tools such as HeadingsMap, Lists and Text spacing to help with some of these checks.
Consider assistive technology
Some people with cognitive impairments use assistive technology to read, understand or interact with content.
Test your service with relevant assistive technology where appropriate.
Understand user needs
Accessibility personas can help you understand how people with different access needs might experience your service. They are a starting point for identifying user needs and deciding what to test.
Simone – dyslexic user
Simone uses specialist dyslexia software that reads documents and web pages aloud and helps her read and spell.
She needs:
plain language save and return functionality clear, structured content
[View Simone's profile and task]
Related guidance
[Find and use tools]
[False positives and false assurance]